10 Essential WordPress Plugins for a Freelancer

When you’re a freelancer with a WordPress site, plugins are your best friends. They can add functionality that your basic WordPress installation just doesn’t have. Plugins do everything from assisting with marketing to improving the template you’ve selected to display your work. Many plugins play well together, so you can choose to use multiple ones that address any need you have.

VaultPress

When your WordPress site represents your freelance business, you must keep it backed up and protected against any unexpected errors. A plugin like VaultPress makes a copy of your site and prepares it to be restored if it disappears or is deleted. Not only does it back up your WordPress site, it also checks your site for errors or threats and then goes through the process of fixing them. Prices start at $3.50 per month or you can choose an annual plan for $39 per year.

Drip

Being able to connect with readers and clients is an essential skill for any freelancer. Drip Marketing Automation Plugin can help by creating intelligent Facebook ads from Drip itself – you can change or update them based on how viewers are reacting. It also offers a visual workflow builder and the ability to automate many things using a mix of 18 triggers and 16 actions. It’s a powerful plugin that can assist you in extending your social reach.

Akismet

Having a comment section is a great way to let your clients chime in on pieces you’re publishing. However, too much spam can make your WordPress site look low-quality. Akismet helps remove spam comments by checking each one left on your site against its own database. You can also make sure that comments with misleading URLs are removed using this plugin. It makes your site a more professional, safer place.

Instagram Image Gallery

The design of your site says a lot about what you can offer clients. If part of your freelance business involves using Instagram, connect it to your site and make it a design element. Instagram Image Gallery offers a simple and clean-looking place to display photos from your Instagram feed. It’s a good way to tie your web presence together.

Jetpack

Jetpack offers more ways to interact with your readers and deliver more traffic to your site. You can publish links to the freelance content you write on social sites, link related posts, and get help with search engine optimization. Since visibility is key for a freelancer, Jetpack is a huge help. It offers security services, backup services, and help with content creation as well. You can use it to embed content from other sides, host high-definition video, and enable infinite scroll.

CaptainForm

To get information from your readers or potential clients, it’s essential to have a good set of forms available. Even more important is the ability to personalize the forms so they reflect your business and the exact information you require. CaptainForm offers a plugin that handles both of these and more. With it, you can set up fully-featured WordPress forms and surveys. Place them using their drag-and-drop editor, choose from one of many templates, and offer security to your users with advanced security features like password protection and encryption. CaptainForm has a variety of plans that work for any budget.

Appointments+

If you’re overwhelmed with clients, using a calendar to schedule meetings for each project can be a big help. Appointments+ lets clients make appointments right on your WordPress site. It’s especially helpful if your site manages content and appointments for multiple freelancers, since you can setup appointments with different providers and make deposits for services. Instead of having to field calls, you can set up times that you’re available and then allow people to make appointments at will during those times.

Copyright Proof

Protect your work with Copyright Proof. This WordPress plugin provides a digitally signed and time-stamped certificate of content that you can apply to each post. It automatically generates this and places it at the end of each of your posts on your site. There are also anti-theft features and the plugin will even make a note of the ip address of people who try to steal your content. While you likely already own your word, Copyright Proof offers a time-stamped and digital file that proves it.

WPtouch

There’s a chance that people aren’t accessing your post on a desktop computer. The amount of time people spend on mobile devices is increasing while the amount of time spent on desktop computers is decreasing. It’s important that your WordPress site is responsive and can adjust to look great on any device. WPtouch automatically updates your freelance site so that it looks great on a mobile device. It also claims to help improve your search engine optimization, since having a site that isn’t responsive might hurt your ranking.

WP Super Cache

People don’t want to spend a lot of time waiting for your site to load. If it’s too slow, you might even lose a new client who navigates away and chooses another site to visit. WP Super Cache increases the perceived loading speed of your site by showing users a cached page instead of generating a new one from your server. It generates static html files that are shown to visitors instead of loading the standard WordPress PHP scripts that take longer to load. It also offers ways to make parts of your page stay dynamic if there’s something you want continuously updated for every new visitor.

Using WordPress plugins can add a lot of functionality to your freelance WordPress website. From showing pictures to improving user experience, they serve a wide variety of functions. Since they’re so easy to install and remove, there’s no reason not to try a few and see what they can do for you.